The Edmonton Oilers took a major step back under Ralph Krueger last season. Under (the much criticized) Tom Renney, the 2011-12 Oilers had dramatically improved in their ability to win the shots battle with the opposition; poor goaltending from Nikolai Khabibulin and other factors obscured the improvement but it was there. Renney was fired and Krueger promoted, and the team stepped into an elevator shaft.

But I’m not really writing about that. I’m writing about the second most-criticized man in any hockey rink, the head coach, and why so much of the criticism misses the mark.

Things We Criticize

Thinking back to Ralph Krueger and Tom Renney, what parts of their coaching were most criticized? For me, the list is basically this:

Poor leadership. He’s not demanding enough or he’s not willing to hold guys accountable or the team doesn’t feed off his emotion all belong to this class of complaint. (Or, going back a few years, this is the “MacT has lost the room” argument).

Poor lineup choices. He’s playing the veterans too much and the kids too little, or he has the wrong goalie in net, or he’s left a guy in the minors too long, or he hates offensive talent, or even he won’t dress the enforcer all fall under this heading.

As fans and pundits and media we’re very good at critiquing perceived problems with a coach’s personality or presentation, and very good at hammering on him for not putting the lines together the way we’d like.

Things We Only Criticize After The Fact

Of course, there’s a whole other part of a coach’s job – arguably the main part – that almost never gets hammered in advance of the problems showing up. That’s tactics. In writing this piece, I tried to think of a time where I’d seen some tweeter or commenter or blogger or distinguished member of the media wing of the Hockey Hall of Fame look at a team and say, ‘you know what, he has his initial forechecker committed too deep when his second forward is pressuring the pass; this team is going to struggle to gain possessions relative to the rest of the league off dump-ins’ and then go back a few months later and say, ‘see all this trouble – it’s because his initial forechecker overcommits rather than breaking back after he’s forced the pass.’

I’m not criticizing those commenters or bloggers or distinguished veteran reporters; I fall into the same boat. It’s difficult to look at an NHL coach’s system and say, ‘he’s doing it wrong, let me explain how.’ For starters, it requires a strong understanding of tactics that most of us simply don’t have and secondly it requires a lot of chutzpah to say ‘I know enough to critique an NHL coach’s tactics.’ There are a handful of TV commentators that at their best can make valid, insightful comments on why a strategy succeeds or fails, but they’re a small group. Beyond Don Cherry, who time has caught up with and left in the rearview mirror, I’m struggling to think of one that brings up perceived tactical problems regularly.

That’s understandable. It’s also an issue.

The Great Leader of Men

Let’s shift gears for a moment, because there’s an analogy I want to make. Think of a great military leader – a general or an admiral or whatever – in terms of the three areas we’ve outlined with coaches. Of the things he does, which matters the most – his ability to inspire his men, ensuring his most competent officers are put in the best positions, or his ability to out-think his opposition counterpart? Without question, they’re all important, but his ability to cheer the men and promote the right officers is going to be irrelevant if he’s sending them into an enemy ambush. It’s the tactics that matter the most.

That takes us to George Rodney, one of Britain’s most successful admirals – and given the history of the Royal Navy, that’s saying a lot. Wikipedia has a decent write-up on him, while Military History Monthly goes into his tactical genius. He’s basically the opposite of the guy we described in the last paragraph, not only because he was a brilliant tactician but also because he was terribly lacking in the other two areas. He had a reputation for playing favourites, for taking prize money for himself that should have gone to his captains and just generally for being dishonest and awful with his subordinates. But he was brilliant as a commander because he was an innovative tactician with a knack for applying the most force at the most critical point.

Now, there’s an argument to be made that for a coach at the NHL level, the ability to inspire players and especially to put the best lineup together is more important relative to tactics than it is for a military commander. I think that’s likely true, but I also think that their importance is vastly overemphasized relative to tactics in the media not because they matter more but because we’re bad (as a class) at critiquing tactics. Jacques Lemaire, love him or hate him, was a tactical innovator and extraordinarily successful because of it. And here’s how Chicago GM Stan Bowman described his father, legendary coach Scotty Bowman:

The one thing my dad’s always been so good at, I think, is he’s been able to adjust…. [F]or a guy who’s ‘old school’ and has been around so long, he’s incredibly progressive and willing to try new things, willing to do things which are not the norm, and that’s what made him successful as a coach … he was very unpredictable … I think all coaches today are kind of – I don’t want to say programmed – but they’re led to do a certain thing. So if you can force yourself to try things maybe a little different or take a different approach, it’s going to give you that advantage. Ironically I think what makes him so exceptional is that he didn’t think he had all the answers.

Back To The Oilers

Thanks to Tyler Dellow’s work, there is a very good argument that there was a specific tactical problem with Ralph Krueger’s teams when compared to Tom Renney’s teams. Their play in the neutral zone, more specifically in the 45 seconds following a neutral zone faceoff win, imploded. They were worse everywhere, statistically, but the numbers here were night-and-day. What, exactly, were they doing wrong? I don’t know, and I’ve yet to see a convincing argument from anyone on that point. But on Oilers Now yesterday, assistant coach Steve Smith made it clear that Dallas Eakins thinks he knows – he said “there were some things that [Eakins] didn’t believe in or understand what Ralph was doing” with respect to the club’s neutral zone system.

If Eakins fixes the problem, the team will be much better. Doubtless, we’ll hear a lot about how he’s holding players accountable and getting the most out of his line combinations, and maybe that will be true. But it isn’t those things that got Ralph Krueger fired – he wasn’t canned because he didn’t get mad enough at press conferences or throw enough chairs in the dressing room or sometimes had Nail Yakupov on the third line. It was almost certainly results, driven by that neutral zone collapse, that made Krueger vulnerable and it seems likely that the collapse was caused by tactical problems.

Eakins, wisely, has talked a lot about his approach to players and accountability, but there have been little comments from him and others all summer about tactical changes too, from Eakins comment on running multiple systems the day he was hired to Smith’s answer yesterday. The former points have gotten a lot of press, but I can’t shake the idea that it is his abilities in the latter area that will make him succeed or fail in Edmonton.

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One example I can think of right away (which shows how rare such criticism is) was that of Ron Wilson in Toronto, and his mandate that defensemen keep both hands on their stick in the defensive zone. In general, though, there is very little discussion of tactical difference between NHL teams, certainly in comparison to what we see in NFL or NBA coverage. Tyler Dellow highlighted that a few weeks ago in his post breaking down the Nashville Predators' tendencies after losing neutral-zone faceoffs.

The problem is most people focus on the Hollywood stuff. He's a great motivator, he makes guys accountable, etc...

Motivation stems from these win one for the giper, any given sunday speeches that the movies love to toss out. In the end, they mean nothing because extrinsic motivation just doesn't work long term.

Making guys accountable is a great theory, but when your only solution is to replace them with worse players, how does that help?

Hockey isn't really a complicated sport. The idea on offence is to get the puck to the prime scoring area and get a shot off. The idea on defence is to prevent the other team from doing the same. I want the coach that teaches that the best.

Coaches are largely irrelevant assuming that NHL coaches are all of a pretty similar skill level to be coaching at the NHL level.

Talent wins or loses hockey games. Coaches affect the combination of talent through 1) forming lines (of low importance), 2) distribution of ice time (of higher importance), 3) and tactics as you point out (which is largely a zero sum game, as countered by other capable coaches).

I don't deny that they may some outliers for coaching ability in the short term, but in the long term, coaching is basically a wash in the NHL, and is a low or non-factor in team success. On ice talent, and to a lesser degree the GM who assembles the talent has a much larger significant effect on team success.

Coaches are largely irrelevant assuming that NHL coaches are all of a pretty similar skill level to be coaching at the NHL level.

Talent wins or loses hockey games. Coaches affect the combination of talent through 1) forming lines (of low importance), 2) distribution of ice time (of higher importance), 3) and tactics as you point out (which is largely a zero sum game, as countered by other capable coaches).

I don't deny that they may some outliers for coaching ability in the short term, but in the long term, coaching is basically a wash in the NHL, and is a low or non-factor in team success. On ice talent, and to a lesser degree the GM who assembles the talent has a much larger significant effect on team success.

That's a nice theory, but is it true? And if it is, why do so many general managers fire their coaches every year?

Are they idiots, foolishly shifting deck chairs on the Titanic, or are they cynics playing the PR game, or do they believe the coach makes a difference and are smart to address a problem?

I can honestly say that I am not comfortable ripping on tactics until I see it fail first. Even then, I'm not qualified. I barely know what to look for. Compare the game of hockey to football and it's vastly different. The game of football isnt fluid at all. Stops and starts, all tactics.

I am much more comfortable ripping the Eskimos for calling shotgun draws on the 3 yard line than I am ripping Krueger for something that I can only "feel" is wrong about the way his team backchecks.

I lack the education or experience discerning different hockey tactics, and thats with me watching the game my whole life.

The only time I even half-@ssed brought it up last year was on the 5v3. The situation is so unique and pronounced that it lends itself to be critiqued much more easily.

Although I disagree on "time catching up on Don Cherry". He is still quite insightful and has adapted to the changing times. I haven't seen him say anything like "all Europeans are soft" in many years. The fact that you state he is the only commentator who brings up coaching tactical problems regularily somewhat contradicts your point. Maybe you could elaborate?

I can honestly say that I am not comfortable ripping on tactics until I see it fail first. Even then, I'm not qualified. I barely know what to look for. Compare the game of hockey to football and it's vastly different. The game of football isnt fluid at all. Stops and starts, all tactics.

I am much more comfortable ripping the Eskimos for calling shotgun draws on the 3 yard line than I am ripping Krueger for something that I can only "feel" is wrong about the way his team backchecks.

I lack the education or experience discerning different hockey tactics, and thats with me watching the game my whole life.

The only time I even half-@ssed brought it up last year was on the 5v3. The situation is so unique and pronounced that it lends itself to be critiqued much more easily.

And you aren't alone; there are precious few out there who have the resume to say 'you know, Dallas Eakins is doing x wrong, tactically.' I know I don't feel comfortable doing that kind of thing.

It's something I tried to learn more about this year, something I've been reading about this summer and something I hope to be able to highlight more frequently - if not in a critical way, at least in a 'look at what they're doing here' kind of way.

The problem is most people focus on the Hollywood stuff. He's a great motivator, he makes guys accountable, etc...

Motivation stems from these win one for the giper, any given sunday speeches that the movies love to toss out. In the end, they mean nothing because extrinsic motivation just doesn't work long term.

Making guys accountable is a great theory, but when your only solution is to replace them with worse players, how does that help?

Hockey isn't really a complicated sport. The idea on offence is to get the puck to the prime scoring area and get a shot off. The idea on defence is to prevent the other team from doing the same. I want the coach that teaches that the best.

DB, IIRC you did a great break-down series on Copper & Blue before.

I really enjoyed that. It would be great if you would take a crack at this again.

Although I disagree on "time catching up on Don Cherry". He is still quite insightful and has adapted to the changing times. I haven't seen him say anything like "all Europeans are soft" in many years. The fact that you state he is the only commentator who brings up coaching tactical problems regularily somewhat contradicts your point. Maybe you could elaborate?

Remember in the playoffs when he went on and on and on about having wingers come out high and really pressure the points? Even I know that's wrong.

Lots of times in hockey players need to adlib, because the game can change so quickly, and it is rare the coach is responsible for that.

I agree coaches get too much of blame, because ultimately a coach is only as good as his players.

A coach can definitely make an impact, many have proven it, but ultimately if a coach doesn't have quality players they don't win.

I can't remember a coach who won consistently with bad or average players.

Yeah, Mirtle made that same point about the ambiguity between poor system and poor execution of a good system, and it's a valid one - it's hard to critique whether a system works when it isn't clear what the system is because the players don't stick to it.

On your latter point, Lemaire's the only guy who kind of comes to mind in Minnesota, and that wasn't a team totally bereft of talent.

1) Did not have a training camp.
2) Had a compressed schedule, he couldn't shorten the bench.
3) Had no games against the easy eastern conference.
4) Had to veteran assistant coach.
5) Had a rookie he was forced to play in the top four instead of Tom Gilbert.

And he was not given an opportunity to have an off-season to study and reflect how he could do things differently.

The piling on on Krueger is ridiculous, especially since Justin Schultz claims it was Krueger that sold him on Edmonton.

What is Krueger's sin? Not protecting bad hockey players. Showing up management so bad, that the new GM had to overturn nearly half of the roster. Krueger believes in team, And that means every player, and every one in the organization has to pull their weight. When you have been 30th, 30th, and 29th for three years, and missed the playoffs for six, what is the point of trying to be short term tactical, over long-term strategic.

To compare a first time coach under the conditions Krueger inherited the team with a 3rd time head coach (with at best a mediocre track record) is unfair.

So Krueger tactic's were horrible. He still did better in the standings, because of other things (including probably luck) even though the tactics were bad. However, Hall had a breakout season. Nugent-Hopkins, at 19, showed that he could be a 200-foot two way player. Yakupov arrived after 20 games. Basically all the good players thrived. All the bad ones dived. And, screw tactics, because that probably was a damn good thing.

Krueger forced the organization out of its comatose state.

That said. MacT is entitled to his own coach. I sort of like Eakins, but there is an awful lot of counting chickens before an Eakins-coached team has played a game.

Strudwick was talking about the European game vs the North American version of hockey while he was filling in on someone's show last week. His point was how the Euro game is quite different from the NA game and it doesn't always translate well on the ice. The larger ice surface is the main difference and therefore coaches have different systems that work.

I think this was Krueger's biggest challenge. He was very successful in Europe and I think he tried to implement a lot of those systems here with the Oilers. We watched "early" in the season when a lot of the players were struggling with his systems, which reflected in our win/loss. I don't think Krueger's game adapted quite the way he envisioned. Had he had a training camp and a full season, things might have been different but that's not what happened.

A coach has to convince the players buy into their ideology of how the game should be played and this is reinforced by winning outcomes on the ice. Talent is an important thing, but if it doesn't develop and thrive you're left with another Al Daigle.

Which leads to the other job a coach has; making their players comfortable so they have a platform to succeed and being able to form relationships with their players. When a player and coach have trust in one another the coach is better equipped to deduce what he needs to do to sustain a player's confidence or get him back on track. Ultimately I believe this leads to player accountability.

If ya coach doesn't have these things then hit the bricks pal because the bus will soon be leaving.

Remember in the playoffs when he went on and on and on about having wingers come out high and really pressure the points? Even I know that's wrong.

Maybe you disagree with the counter tactic but his reasoning for a change was warranted. I seem to recall them being scored on almost at will by the defencemen's play at that point. Which was why he was going on and on about it.

Good read and great insight on a topic none of us really know enough about. I would like to link back to the articles which meticulously broke down various plays in the game. Those articles were great insight into how coaches and players execute on particular systems, and I hope to see those agin this year.

This article is especially interesting when we consider how we use advance stats to demonstrate a player either is or isn't executing a certain aspect of the game. And yet no advanced stats exist to see whether the system that player is playing is a contributing factor on their individual stats. Such as how Kreuger's neutral zone system affected a player's shots for and against. Was it the player being poor in their own end, or was it the coach not knowing how to break into the zone on a faceoff win?

As for Krueger vs other systems, he definitely had some interesting ideas. I like how he tried to win every single game, and actually used a strategy involving line combinations as the game went on to try and improve his chances for the win. Now sometimes he made the wrong choices, but you could very plainly see him trying to win every single game.

The main complaint I've herd levelled against him (not that I know much about what it means), is that he played man coverage as opposed to zone coverage. Knowing how effective zone coverage is in other sports, I wonder how much that small piece affected play. I also know he wasn't big on line matching, which had a lot to do with a shortened season. But still that seems odd to basically not use that advantage when playing at home.

I do think there is still an argument to be made that no matter what system Kruger had in place, it was still people like Ryan Whitney trying to execute it, and failing.

Great article.. To the posters who question whether or not a coach is important at the NHL level.. Think back to the 06 cup run. Mac T implemented a new system on the fly in preparation for Detroit, because he knew we didn't have the horses to run with the big dogs of Detroit.. This strategy almost won us our sixth cup.. To say a coach doesn't really matter, is completely stupid.. A good team has a good coach.. One who can give them a winning system and the motivation to play it.. Simple as that..

That's a nice theory, but is it true? And if it is, why do so many general managers fire their coaches every year?

Are they idiots, foolishly shifting deck chairs on the Titanic, or are they cynics playing the PR game, or do they believe the coach makes a difference and are smart to address a problem?

I haven't heard of any instance in recent years where a coach provides his team such an advantage as to significantly outperform other coaches. I'm not saying coaches aren't good, I'm saying they are all good.

When teams randomly outperform or underperform each year, this is usually attributed to a coach because it is convenient. More likely, this variance is simply random, and noise. High SV%, high SH%, and just the random outcomes that are always prevalent within the curve of expected outcome of games.

Why do GMs fire so many coaches every year? Do GMs not recognize coaching talent? Most coaches aren't rookie NHL coaches, so shouldn't GMs know what they are getting? GMs fire coaches quite simply for their own job preservation. GMs typically have long tenures in the NHL, and if they can pin problems on a coach, they deflect blame from themselves, and the construction of the team (which easily has a bigger impact on winning games).

GMs can't really publicly blame players, or fire them. This would diminish trade value, and also why would they shed more light as their failure on recognizing talent.

If you are looking for an example of coaching in the NBA, sports economists David Berri and Martin Schmidt take a look at coaching in the NBA, and only found evidence of one coach in the modern era outperforming expectations, and that being Phil Jackson.

Quite simply talent is the largest prevailing factor in the outcome of hockey games. Debating coaching talent is probably equivalent of crediting the 4th line as being a large factor of a team's success or failure over a season.

Great article.. To the posters who question whether or not a coach is important at the NHL level.. Think back to the 06 cup run. Mac T implemented a new system on the fly in preparation for Detroit, because he knew we didn't have the horses to run with the big dogs of Detroit.. This strategy almost won us our sixth cup.. To say a coach doesn't really matter, is completely stupid.. A good team has a good coach.. One who can give them a winning system and the motivation to play it.. Simple as that..

Do you not also remember during the '06 season, MacT was about to be fired. His contract was not extended during the season, and he was likely on his way out. Do we really think MacT had outcoached other teams as we were massively outshot in those playoffs, and basically got through on the stellar SV% of Roloson.

Also, if MacT was such a stellar and talented coach, why did we miss the playoffs in '07? Obviously talent has a significantly bigger impact than coaching.

Not to say MacT was a bad coach; he seemed more than capable to me. But you are looking more at the result here than actual actions.

I haven't heard of any instance in recent years where a coach provides his team such an advantage as to significantly outperform other coaches. I'm not saying coaches aren't good, I'm saying they are all good.

When teams randomly outperform or underperform each year, this is usually attributed to a coach because it is convenient. More likely, this variance is simply random, and noise. High SV%, high SH%, and just the random outcomes that are always prevalent within the curve of expected outcome of games.

Why do GMs fire so many coaches every year? Do GMs not recognize coaching talent? Most coaches aren't rookie NHL coaches, so shouldn't GMs know what they are getting? GMs fire coaches quite simply for their own job preservation. GMs typically have long tenures in the NHL, and if they can pin problems on a coach, they deflect blame from themselves, and the construction of the team (which easily has a bigger impact on winning games).

GMs can't really publicly blame players, or fire them. This would diminish trade value, and also why would they shed more light as their failure on recognizing talent.

If you are looking for an example of coaching in the NBA, sports economists David Berri and Martin Schmidt take a look at coaching in the NBA, and only found evidence of one coach in the modern era outperforming expectations, and that being Phil Jackson.

Quite simply talent is the largest prevailing factor in the outcome of hockey games. Debating coaching talent is probably equivalent of crediting the 4th line as being a large factor of a team's success or failure over a season.

ugh, what an obviously terrible comment.

If coaches really don't matter, how do explain the success of the Coyotes year after year. On paper they are not a good team, and should be front runners to miss the play offs every year. But they have Tippet.

That, I'm sure, is only one of an insurmountable number of examples that make your point rather worthless.

Do you not also remember during the '06 season, MacT was about to be fired. His contract was not extended during the season, and he was likely on his way out. Do we really think MacT had outcoached other teams as we were massively outshot in those playoffs, and basically got through on the stellar SV% of Roloson.

Also, if MacT was such a stellar and talented coach, why did we miss the playoffs in '07? Obviously talent has a significantly bigger impact than coaching.

Not to say MacT was a bad coach; he seemed more than capable to me. But you are looking more at the result here than actual actions.

Why did the team miss the playoffs in '07? Because the team was just awful in the first place.

They were giving NHL games to guys like Sebastian Bisaillion, Bryan Young, Danny Syvret and Mathieu Roy.

Hejda, Staios and Tjarnqvist (3 of the top 4 defensemen) all missed significant time because of injury. They were also bringing in basically 2 rookies in Smid and Greene at the same time.

They 3 NHL C's in Horcoff, Reasoner and Stoll (who got hurt and missed the last 30 or so games).

1) Did not have a training camp.
2) Had a compressed schedule, he couldn't shorten the bench.
3) Had no games against the easy eastern conference.
4) Had to veteran assistant coach.
5) Had a rookie he was forced to play in the top four instead of Tom Gilbert.

And he was not given an opportunity to have an off-season to study and reflect how he could do things differently.

The piling on on Krueger is ridiculous, especially since Justin Schultz claims it was Krueger that sold him on Edmonton.

What is Krueger's sin? Not protecting bad hockey players. Showing up management so bad, that the new GM had to overturn nearly half of the roster. Krueger believes in team, And that means every player, and every one in the organization has to pull their weight. When you have been 30th, 30th, and 29th for three years, and missed the playoffs for six, what is the point of trying to be short term tactical, over long-term strategic.

To compare a first time coach under the conditions Krueger inherited the team with a 3rd time head coach (with at best a mediocre track record) is unfair.

So Krueger tactic's were horrible. He still did better in the standings, because of other things (including probably luck) even though the tactics were bad. However, Hall had a breakout season. Nugent-Hopkins, at 19, showed that he could be a 200-foot two way player. Yakupov arrived after 20 games. Basically all the good players thrived. All the bad ones dived. And, screw tactics, because that probably was a damn good thing.

Krueger forced the organization out of its comatose state.

That said. MacT is entitled to his own coach. I sort of like Eakins, but there is an awful lot of counting chickens before an Eakins-coached team has played a game.

some solid points especially Krueger waking the organization up. they certainly were sleeping, thinking they could draft their entire lineup. At least now, they seem aware that the waiting window is shut, fans are demanding results, and some savvy managerial moves are required.

Management, not coaching, is the single most important factor in an organization's short and long term success. Scouting, drafting and development probably being the most important aspects of management. And in these areas the Oilers have been the worst in the league.

As you say, we can thank Krueger for exposing Tambo and especially Lowe for complete and utter incompetence. Hopefully, this is Lowe's last kick at the can. If MacT fails, a top to bottom house cleaning must follow.

That's a nice theory, but is it true? And if it is, why do so many general managers fire their coaches every year?

Are they idiots, foolishly shifting deck chairs on the Titanic, or are they cynics playing the PR game, or do they believe the coach makes a difference and are smart to address a problem?

I like Mac T's assessment on coaching.........they usually receive too much criticism when things are going wrong and too much credit when things are going well.

All coaches want to win and usually play guys that play according to their expectations. Renny use to over play Horcoff in spite of his iron hands, I for one could never see his value on the PP.........but there he was almost every time. He once said if the young guys want PP time they had better learn to play the other side of the puck first.

He is fired now, followed by Krueger, soon to be followed by Eakins. Coaches get fired to cover for inept senior managers like Lowe.......plain and simple.

"And yet no advanced stats exist to see whether the system that player is playing is a contributing factor on their individual stats."

Stats in and of themselves don't tell the entire story. But they illuminate areas of interest/concern that can then be looked at in detail. For instance the work of Tyler Dellow which Willis linked to in his article, http://www.mc79hockey.com/?p=6122 does this nicely. The stats showed a drastic drop in everyone but the first line. So knowing that there was a problem, he then goes into looking at specific events that occur over and over again and isolates a problem.

And Dellow makes the good point that hockey happens too fast and has too many events to judge accurately by eye. Stats help break things down in digestible portions and then you go with video from there if need be.

The best example of the difference coaching can make is the transition from Wayne Gretzky to Dave Tippet in Pheonix. With pretty much the same players they went from the basement to the playoffs iirc.

Disagree. The Coyotes were 2 - 12 under Rick Bowness, Gretzky took over and went 38 - 39. That's a significant change.

Gretzky also overhauled the lineup and went with a lot of kids, those kids were seasoned when Tippet took over. Tippet was positioned for success, much like Eakins is here this year. Not that Tippet isn't a better coach by any stretch, just saying it isn't so black and white.

Oiler's biggest problem that I see is they really, really struggle to sustain pressure in the other teams end. You never see the Oiler's hem the other team into their zone for extended periods. This always ends up in the Oiler's spending too much time in their zone. Oiler's need Hitchcock. Someone first need to teach them about checking. Hitchcock could teach them to take time and space away from the other team, and teach them how to fore check properly. Once they know this, then they can start using their talent on top of this to break games wide open.

But your point about how none of us are really educated enough to judge a system is probably the take away from this article. I'd like to think people reading this site aren't yelling "SHOOOOOOOooooot" the entire powerplay, but even that I doubt.

I haven't heard of any instance in recent years where a coach provides his team such an advantage as to significantly outperform other coaches. I'm not saying coaches aren't good, I'm saying they are all good.

When teams randomly outperform or underperform each year, this is usually attributed to a coach because it is convenient. More likely, this variance is simply random, and noise. High SV%, high SH%, and just the random outcomes that are always prevalent within the curve of expected outcome of games.

Why do GMs fire so many coaches every year? Do GMs not recognize coaching talent? Most coaches aren't rookie NHL coaches, so shouldn't GMs know what they are getting? GMs fire coaches quite simply for their own job preservation. GMs typically have long tenures in the NHL, and if they can pin problems on a coach, they deflect blame from themselves, and the construction of the team (which easily has a bigger impact on winning games).

GMs can't really publicly blame players, or fire them. This would diminish trade value, and also why would they shed more light as their failure on recognizing talent.

If you are looking for an example of coaching in the NBA, sports economists David Berri and Martin Schmidt take a look at coaching in the NBA, and only found evidence of one coach in the modern era outperforming expectations, and that being Phil Jackson.

Quite simply talent is the largest prevailing factor in the outcome of hockey games. Debating coaching talent is probably equivalent of crediting the 4th line as being a large factor of a team's success or failure over a season.

Phil Jackson had Jordan and Kobe;if I had to think of an example in the NBA, Popovich and Sloan were able to do more with less. Spurs almost won it over Miami this year too and they didn't have half the talent Miami had.

Of course a coach can influence the game. His greatest currency is playing time; and if he didn't have the right people at the right time or don't use their personnel properly then they have to be held accountable for it. Would adding a couple more minutes to the to the top lines and less on the bottom lines pay off? Maybe it does, that's ultimately a coaches decision.

It's a guess how much parity there is in coaching in the NHL since it's hard to quantify that, but talent is never the same. And I do think some coaches will be able to get more from their team than others. But like you said, it's futile to argue such things.

Krueger was out of his element night in and night out. You don't need statistical proof to see that the Oilers had major problems gaining zone entry at all, much less maintaining puck possession if they did manage to get in. You just had to watch all the games to watch the horrific pattern unfold. He couldn't, or wouldn't, change or adapt it and if he did his changes were ineffectual.

I'm not even going to lay the blame on the players for this one since I feel that if a system is clearly giving the players a heap of trouble to execute, it's on the coach to come up with a new strategy that's more effective. Ralph never did and that's on him. He paid the price for his inability or inaction, whichever it was.

1) I believe I read somewhere this summer (here?) that if they fire Eakins they will have to pay 3 coaches next year. It seems likely he will have at least a year to grow into the team and vice versa.
2) "Systems" require coaches that buy into or set the system parameters ... else there would be no Montreal, Dallas, or even Edmonton style hockey. Read here ... "the trap". How well the team learns the system or buys into it is reflected (somewhat) in the success of that team.

3)Peca is on record as saying MacT was a brilliant coach. It seems likely that at certain times tactics make a difference and knowing the abilities of the players one has and how to motivate them must also contribute to their reaching that "next level". Think Scotty Boman.

4) Special teams can make or break any team.
The PP coach needs to understand tactics and/or
specific plays to use to an advantage. I think it reasonable to say the defensive system for the whole team is relevant. To fore check or not
and when to do it and how. Defensive coach teaches the D when and where to be effective.
The head coach needs to be aware of his assistants and the skills they bring.